Palestine college student protest megathread

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Such a shame that some students were bound and determined to turn a solemn and meaningful ceremony into a political rally for a cause they're very poorly informed about.  The university was not willing to endure such a sad, obnoxious spectacle and instead made the reasonable decision to cancel.  Now all their fellow students who just wanted to enjoy graduation -- especially after missing 2020 high school graduation because of COVID -- are robbed of it because of the selfishness of a few assholes who see the entire world as just a collection of platforms for them to jump up on and chant "from the river to the sea, Palestine will be Arab free"

Are you allergic to acknowledging that there are a sizeable amount of non-problematic protestors that aren't racist and just don't like seeing grandmas and babies getting blown up by bombs or starving to death? It seems like you actively go out of your way to make sure that you don't acknowledge that they exist in your posts.

There is no overlap between the reasonable protesters and the protesters trying to ruin a graduation ceremony for thousands of innocent people.

I’m glad you’re concerned about thousands of innocent people. I can think of a few more such thousands who are suffering a lot worse than a canceled graduation ceremony.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

It's telling about how weak their movement is that they keep comparing themselves to the anti-Vietnam and anti-Apartheid protests.  Their protest isn't strong enough to stand on its own so they have to defend it by leeching off the romanticized reputation of more popular protests.  Basically "oh you don't like us?  well guess that means you wouldn't have liked the anti-Vietnam protests either.  you're either pro-protest or anti-protest."

BTW, were anti-Apartheid student protests actually a big thing?  I had never heard about them prior to last week.  Or are the students magnifying the impact and significance of what were actually a handful of small protests at various universities including Columbia?

You’re essentially making their point for them. Anti-Vietnam protests were far less popular at the time than they are made to seem nowadays; we only see them as righteous (and implicitly more popular) now because they’re more cool and woke and seen by the liberal consensus as being on the right side of history. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/04/24/polling-student-protests-vietnam/

In fact, given your post history, I have no trouble believing that you in particular would have been strongly against anti-Vietnam protests.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Apparently they’re banning all students who live off-campus from campus now.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Apparently they’re banning all students who live off-campus from campus now.

lol wat

Only students who live in on-campus housing and essential workers (facilities, lab techs, etc) will be allowed on campus is what I’m hearing.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Time to move in with the dogs.

Shades of Bull Connor.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Columbia is well on its way to being CUNY-Morningside at this rate. With the 90K tuition. At least the CUNYs don't cost much

Why’s being like CUNY supposed to be an threat?

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

This dude on CNN, Mahmoud Khalil, started his bit by saying it's shameful that on the 55th anniversary of 1968 student protests, the school would kick out anti-Israel protesters.  Where does this sense of entitlement come from?  When did the 1968 student protests, which were widely opposed by the silent majority and a political disaster for the anti-war party, become this sacred thing?  Some students protested in 1968, so now every protest is sacred?  C'mon.

Now he's complaining that the school wouldn't bring them blankets when they tried to illegally sleep over in the building they broke into.  FFS

Okay but they were morally in the right, right? Regardless of their effectiveness, which can certainly be discussed vis-a-vis these protests, do you think the Vietnam War - the thing they were protesting - was good or bad?

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

I don’t care whether you think Israel’s actions in Gaza are justified or not. The actions and conduct of these protesters has been straight up despicable and you should be ashamed of yourself if you’re still supporting them.

They're certainly not doing their cause any favors.

It seems to be a trend in this country where protests don't really evoke sympathy or support in our society, and often fuel the reverse.

See also: the George Floyd protests.

Mitt Romney supported the George Floyd protests.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

The American people overwhelmingly support the police’s actions, including young people. Almost a majority support banning “pro-Palestinian” protests.
https://twitter.com/jimcmann/status/1786018438151844214?s=46&t=o2RmfeV6yYJk0...

The people who want to ban protests about the conflict on campus, and in particular those who want to ban pro-Palestinian protests but not pro-Israel protests, are traitors to this country and its Constitution.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Why Why Why Why Why

WHY

is the left so invested in Palestine? Their values are literally the opposite of progressives value.

Fight against ISRAEL but do not fight FOR Islamic values!

I don’t think someone’s humanity depends on whether they share my values.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

I wonder what the grad/undergrad split is.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/financially-hobbled-for-life-the-elite-masters-degrees-that-dont-pay-off-11625752773
For Columbia a lot of the grad students are just cash cows but at this point they probably cost more money than they bring in due to donors being mad so it makes perfect sense to expel them.

Average libertarian

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

For those not in the Discord, I visited the UW encampment yesterday and it was basically what I expected based on my previous description that "this is just like the early days of CHAZ."

When I was at college we had an event every September for the freshmen where you would get six of your friends together and set up tents on the main student green, and you'd sleep over in the tents.  Everyone would decorate their tents so it kind of had this Halloween feel, and different student organizations and Greek houses would have their new freshman recruits turn their tents into an organization tent so it also served as kind of an orientation event.  You'd go to different tents to meet people and see what they were about.  And then there was also this kind of sexual aspect to it because the tents were coed so you were putting together a group of six friends you'd known for maybe a couple weeks, and maybe you wanted to know the girls better and hoped that by sleeping together in a small tent it would lead to some cuddling or some emotional intimacy or at least something to build on for the future.  It was also very socially stressful because "pick your top 6 friends" meant you would find out who considered you a top friend and who was going to exclude you.  Interesting phenomenon in general.

Anyway, that was what this reminded me of.  Every tent had its own "thing" going on and it was all playacting like they were either a warzone, or a music festival, or a mini-school.  So one tent was making s'mores, one tent was doing finger painting, one tent was offering to teach you about the time in 1475 the Jews kidnapped a toddler for ritual sacrifice and cannibalism.  There was some Arabic music being played over a speaker that I'm sure 95% of the students couldn't understand.  There were also tents for different organizations -- including one hilarious one for the evangelical christians on campus that said "Ask me why you will burn in hell" and was actually attracting the most attention as students wanted to intellectually defeat the guy trying to tell them why Jesus Christ was the truth.

It's very similar vibes to the early days of CHAZ, which people thought was just going to be a block party.  You had various pop-up canopies for different activities and organizations that you could browse, and there was food and drink and live music and most people were just treating it as a way to have fun.  But of course there were also lots of "ACAB" and "Defund the Police" and "Piggies go Home" and "Murderers!" and those kinds of signs and sidewalk chalk and posters and paintings and things like that, and plenty of people who wanted to tell you all about their ideology.  I really can't overstate just how much "From the river to the sea" and "Intifada!" are the two most popular slogans after the generic "Free Palestine" -- I thought "end the genocide" would be more popular but nope there was "intifada" plastered on everything in sight.

idk, kids in their 20s like doing this kind of thing, street festivals are one of the few ways left to have a proper third-space where people will actually want to talk to each other and socialize.  The problem is twofold.

First, they're doing it in service of a bad cause -- the Palestinian cause is bad, the intifada and 10/7 were blood-soaked terror events that are bad to celebrate or defend, and in particular the genocidal and racist anti-Zionist slogans like "from the river to the sea" are bad, and by and large they only support this because they are woefully misinformed, mostly by social media.  The sorts of signs and artwork that I saw of progressive paradise Palestine was reflective of this, you know, Gaza with the LGBTQIAP++ flag and things like that.

The second is that these sorts of things are often going to end up hijacked by the radicals and opportunists who will veer it off in a direction of violence and extremism and lawlessness.  That was what happened with CHAZ, that happened at Columbia and UCLA, I'm hoping it won't happen at UW because it will make my commute annoying to have streets shut down.

I really think you should stop engaging with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as much as possible for the time being. We saw what you posted before you were infracted, and it’s clear that this is leading you down a very dark path. To put it bluntly, you are being - or have already been - radicalized into racism.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

I really think you should stop engaging with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as much as possible for the time being. We saw what you posted before you were infracted, and it’s clear that this is leading you down a very dark path. To put it bluntly, you are being - or have already been - radicalized into racism.

Nothing about this post is racist and you should apologize for making such an obviously false allegation.

Nothing about my post I got infracted for was racist either.  The mods have done me a disservice by deleting it so that people can just run around telling wild lies about what it said.  If anyone wants the actual original post, DM me on Discord.

If saying “Palestinians are bad” isn’t racist, what is? Come on, man.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Good thread that pretty much explains my thoughts on this issue.

maybe.  What would happen if you asked a rando civil rights supporter in 1959 what they were marching for? Would they say something like "I'm here because it's not right that black folk and white folk can't go to school and shop together...ride the bus together. play little league, all the stuff" or would they run away or say amazingly stupid things?


and even if you're 100% correct, it doesn't make it not funny to outsiders.

The Civil Rights Movement of the 50s and 60s, had strong credibility through it's leadership. MLK, John Lewis, were not just.... men of moral character, but they were also pretty politically savvy, and had realistic goals in mind, and they were also astute intellectuals.


Who in the pro Palestinian movement in the US now has the pedigree, charisma, and the stature of MLK ?

They were also very unpopular.